Diamond Tooth Taxidermy Blog:

Here's a fun trophy mount I just finished for a new father & son hunting duo; the son harvested this gorgeous pheasant and wanted to preserve it.

It goes without saying that I of course dined on pheasant for the next few days. Then, fueled properly on bird juice, I set to mounting this creature. Please forgive these photos; I waited until the client was literally in the parking lot of my shop to get around to shooting and the process was somewhat rushed. The flash actually kind of makes the first photo look a bit like an action shot, right?Right?

I went with an open winged descent pose to display the full color and texture range of his feathers:

The shot destroyed the tip of his beak and left several of his lil pheasant toes dangling from their foot source, so some restoration was required.

Ta-Da!

Another oddly lit shot:

Rearish view:

Not much else to say; client was pleased and so am I.

I am aiming to really step up my technical game this year, and achieve complete realisation of the designs my head spins of dream taxidermy mounts. I treasure commissioned jobs like this pheasant, the squirrels I just wrote about and pet preservation because it allows me the work to pursue my more artistic and far-out endeavors. I have grand visions for 2014; here's to ambition!